MORE than 200 British holidaymakers have finally arrived home after a drunk and abusive man caused their Birmingham-bound plane to be diverted.

MORE than 200 British holidaymakers have finally arrived home after a drunk and abusive man caused their Birmingham-bound plane to be diverted.

The passengers, who were on a flight from Cancun, Mexico back to the Midlands via Manchester, had to spend a night in a Florida hotel after the captain decided to divert the flight following the disturbance.

The man became abusive after drinking his own alcohol and getting into an argument with the person sitting next to him. Passengers had to help cabin crew restrain him.

A spokesman for the FBI in Orlando named the man as Rafal Krawczyk, from Belfast, who has a Polish passport and was born in 1973.

He added: "He has been charged with interfering with a flight crew and will appear before the federal courthouse in Orlando on Tuesday for an initial appearance.

"The FBI becomes involved with incidents like this on an aircraft, particularly once it is airborne."

A spokesman for Thomsonfly said 232 passengers were forced off the flight when the captain decided to divert it to Sanford Airport in Orlando, Florida.

The Boeing 767 had been due to land at Manchester Airport at 7.45am yesterday but landed instead at Birmingham International Airport shortly before 3am today.

Those passengers needing to get back to Manchester were taken there by bus.

The spokesman said: "A passenger apparently had had too much to drink and was drinking his own alcohol.

"He got into an argument with the passenger sitting next to him and got quite aggressive. He went to the toilet and started a bit of fuss and started to smash the toilet up.

"Three crew, with the help of some passengers, managed to control the gent and keep him down. The captain took the decision for the safety of all passengers to take the aircraft into Sanford."

Local police then met the plane and escorted the man off.

Passengers on the flight were put up in hotels and given food, the spokesman said.

Passenger Iain MacGranthin said there were two incidents on board involving the same man.

"There was a scuffle behind me. I looked back and one of the flight attendants had an altercation with one of the passengers.

"There was an anxious moment when the purser called for the cabin crew to doors. But things seemed to settle down for a while then. It was about 20 minutes on and there was a second altercation.

"The passenger had to be restrained by several other travellers. The cabin could not have dealt with it themselves.

"Certainly the purser received a blow to the head, it wasn't a heavy blow."

Mr MacGranthin said he thought at least one other person was also attacked.

The captain had "decided to continue the journey until the second altercation" which "seemed a bit long for me", he added.

A spokeswoman for Sanford Police said the FBI was on the ground to meet the flight when it landed at Sanford International Airport.

"The FBI was called as this was an international flight, and the man was taken into custody," she said.